Allow Me to Introduce You...

This is J. Bear. J. Bear is the class mascot and a couple of weekends ago, he got to spend the weekend with us. We chronicled his entire stay in his journal, including a personal one-on-one adjustment with our chiropractor, a visit to a fall festival, his entrance into the world of Nebraska football, and his run-in with our dog, Ozzie. J. Bear seemed to have a good time, but it seems he's on a long vacation while the children rid themselves of all their diseases and head lice. Yes. I said head lice. EEEEK! Thankfully, we have not fallen victim to this malady.

In addition to having his first official sleepover (he and J. Bear had a grand old time), Cody has begun to help train me in the ways of kindergarten. The other day, we were out doing some errand running, and Caden was being quite...ahem....challenging. After many stern, "NOs" and a few drop-limp-to-the-ground-and-scream-while-everyone-stares-at-you moments, I was almost to my breaking point. After our final errand, we got into the van. While I was trying to hand Caden one of his battery operated trains to hold onto while I strapped him into his carseat, he hauled off and threw the thing at me. This resulted in my loudly saying NO and smacking his little hand. It was effective. Not only was Caden crying, Cody was too.

As I got into the front and buckled myself in, I heard a little weepy voice from the backseat say, "Mom. (sniff sniff) Hands are for helping, NOT hurting!" Yes, he was right. This is one of the "I-Care" rules that they have in their school. I had to stop and calmly explain my reasoning for having to discipline his brother and still get the point across that hands are indeed for helping and not hurting. I'm sure to him, it seemed like a total contradiction!

Then, this morning, I was cutting out some things for his teacher (I have volunteered to do some work at home since it's hard for me to be a helper in the classroom with Caden). I was using one of those fiskar cutters and the blade tore one of the letters. Cody overheard me when I said, "Oh man, I ripped it!" and he rushed over to pat me on the shoulder and say, "That's okay, mom. You're still learning."

Yeah. I'd say Kindergarten has been really great for my kid.